Aung San Suu Kyi's son receives handwritten letter from imprisoned former Myanmar leader after three years of silence
Kim Aris says he recognised his mother's handwriting straight away. The letter is the first confirmation the family has received that the 78-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner is alive after she was removed from power three years ago today.
Thursday 1 February 2024 06:31, UK
After three years of complete silence and no information as to her whereabouts, the family of Aung San Suu Kyi have received their first communication from the former leader of Myanmar since she was removed from power three years ago today.
In a handwritten letter to her son Kim Aris, who lives in the UK, she says she's generally well but is suffering from dental problems and spondylitis, a painful condition that inflames the joints of the backbone.
The letter, her son says, is the first confirmation they have received that the 78-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner is alive.
Mr Aris says he recognised his mother's handwriting straight away.
"I was overjoyed to actually see something in her handwriting, to know that she's able to actually write, for starters, because I haven't had any confirmation that she's actually alive for all these years," he says in an interview with Sky News.
Ms Suu Kyi is serving a 33-year prison sentence on corruption charges her supporters say were made up to keep her from power.
The military junta, which severely restricts her contact with the outside world, allowed her to receive a care package from her family and gave her permission to write what is basically a thank you letter, Mr Aris says.
He received the letter in early January this year.
"She sounded well in terms of her spirits, but she always does," he says when asked if she gave any insight into how she was being treated.
He adds there was little detail in the letter other than a thank you for the care package because she's aware their communications will be read and will be stopped altogether if she attempted to say more.
Suu Kyi likely in solitary confinement
Mr Aris says his family has no idea where she is being held, or if she has any knowledge of what's happening on the outside, only that they have reason to believe she is in solitary confinement.
"I don't know if she's able to get much news outside of the prison, as far as I am aware she is being held apart from all the other prisoners - essentially in solitary confinement but I don't know whether she's in a cell or whether she's in a room in a barracks or if they've built her a separate cell like they have done in the past," he says.
"I do know that she's never accepted any preferential treatment to the other prisoners, so if she is being held separate to the other prisoners and in similar sorts of conditions to them than I can only imagine it's pretty dire."
Mr Aris says his mother hasn't seen her lawyers in over a year, and her only contact with an outside official was a visit from Thailand's foreign minister, who met her in July last year.
Read more:
Maps and charts reveal scale of death and destruction in Myanmar
Why the risk of going to Myanmar was worth taking
Junta brutally suppressed all opposition
Exactly three years ago the military junta seized control of the country on the day a new parliament was due to be sworn in.
The coup was greeted with massive protests on the streets of the country's cities, within days the junta deployed police and army units who brutally suppressed all opposition. The protests went on for a year, and at least 1,500 protesters were said to have been killed in that time.
Myanmar - also known as Burma - is now embroiled in a nationwide civil war, with ethnic armies and militia groups made up of civilian volunteers attacking the junta's forces.
Civilian population continuously targeted
Last year I quietly entered Myanmar and spent a month with the resistance movement in the jungles and countryside.
As the uprising has spread the junta has continuously targeted the civilian population, regularly bombing villages, medical centres, churches, and community buildings, with a campaign of artillery strikes and missile attacks from jets and helicopter gunships.
I saw this first-hand while I was there.
Intense fighting but opposition forces have momentum
In recent weeks the resistance movement has made significant gains against the military, and there are reports that thousands of government soldiers have defected to the opposition or deserted from their posts.
I've been speaking to contacts inside the country, who tell me the fighting is intense, but there is a general feeling the opposition forces have momentum.
One of the surgeons at a hospital I spent time at last year says the hospital is overflowing with patients and they continue to treat soldiers and civilians injured on the battlefield.
The chief surgeon at the hospital says they are in surgery all day, every day, until 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning.
"Now all beds in the hospital are full," Dr Myo Khant Ko Ko writes. "Various types of injuries, head, neck, chest, abdomen, limb fractures and amputations." Some patients have severe injuries to their eyes and jaws, he adds.
Mobile phone videos sent to me by frontline medics, the Free Burma Rangers, verify Dr Myo's account. The videos show badly injured opposition fighters on the frontline being treated by medics. FBR says the fighting has intensified once again.
Be the first to get Breaking News
Install the Sky News app for free
In a statement, the UN Special Rapporteur for the situation of human rights in Myanmar, Tom Andrews said: "The junta is responding to humiliating losses by attacking civilians with aerial and artillery bombardments of towns and villages captured by opposition forces.
"The junta's crimes are enabled by a robust supply of sophisticated weapons from sources outside Myanmar. This creates both an opportunity and an obligation for the international community to act."
Junta continues to attack civilians
Despite sanctions and condemnation from the international community the junta has continued to attack civilians, forcing hundreds of thousands to leave their homes, and many are now living in self-made camps in the jungle.
Very little international aid is being allowed into the country, and all access into Myanmar is strictly limited, especially for aid agencies and foreign journalists.
With all the conflicts in the world right now, particularly the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, the civil war in Myanmar hardly makes news.
'So many people haven't even heard of Burma'
"Burma has always had a hard time getting the headlines over the years, and now is no different, there always seems to be something cropping up that does overshadow what's happening in Burma, and still so many people haven't even heard of Burma, never mind that there is a civil war, a full-blown civil war going on," Ms Suu Kyi's son Mr Aris says.
The ruling military's hope has always been that by forcing civilians from their homes, the people would eventually turn on the opposition, but against their expectations this has not happened. If anything, civilians appear to have increased their support for the armed opposition groups.
The hope, Mr Aris says, is that the military starts to feel pressure from within, unravelling their ambitions.
"I hope that they [the military] will collapse without too much more fighting with everybody else, the stresses going on within should hopefully finish them off, but we can't hope for that, so everybody has got to keep pushing."